


You should see me in a crown

by Lissomedi



Category: The Folk of the Air - Holly Black
Genre: F/M, He's scared, Reunion, She's pissed, she's also ambitious
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-13
Updated: 2019-01-13
Packaged: 2019-10-09 12:26:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,678
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17406878
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lissomedi/pseuds/Lissomedi
Summary: He’s trussed up like a turkey, hands and feet bound, head bare. He tilts his face up toward her, the long column of his throat open and exposed. She revels in his vulnerability.The High King of Faerie meets her gaze, and she sees fear inside his eyes.Her grin is vicious. “Your Majesty.”(Set after The Wicked King.)





	You should see me in a crown

* * *

_If you think I’m pretty,_  
_You should see me in a crown._

* * *

  
The tall, dark form rolls into a sort of graceful fall onto the grass at her feet. He’s trussed up like a turkey, hands and feet bound, head bare. He tilts his face up toward her, the long column of his throat open and exposed.

She revels in his vulnerability.

 The High King of Faerie meets her gaze, and she sees fear inside his eyes.

 “Jude,” he breathes, and even after his betrayal, her months of exile, after _everything—_ the whisper blooms on her skin like a flower.

 But something far more powerful bubbles and hisses in her veins. She is so ravenous for revenge, she feels ready to eat out his heart.

 Her grin is vicious. “Your Majesty.”

 “What—happened?”

He is confused. The white edges of his eyes show as he scans the unfamiliar forest. He looks for backup, for protection. He finds none. There is only Jude, standing above him, tall and straight-backed as a general, gripping the sword that slaughtered her parents.

She leans down to him, until their faces are even. “Did you think that I wouldn’t find a way to you? That you were rid of me? Can you really be so stupid?”

“How?”

“Your kingdom is unstable, my High King. There were so many paths to you, I almost couldn’t choose just one.”

The moonlight filters through the treetops and lights his face. He is beautiful, even huddled at her feet. The points of his cheeks shine, and his eyes are the deep black of the sky. He’s still dressed in kingly clothes, a black velvet coat with intricate gold embroidery on each shoulder, his hair braided with matching golden wire. He would have been opulent and impressive in the throne room, but now he’s rumbled and stained with mud, leaves and twigs snagging in his hair.

She raises the sword, pressing the point into the place where his pulse jumps at his neck.

“Are you afraid?” she asks, her voice liquid.

“Yes.”

For a moment, neither of them speak. Then he moves toward her.

“Jude—” he begins, and she presses the blade to his throat hard enough to draw blood. He stills but says, “Nothing is what you think.”

“You exiled me,” she spits, her voice trembling with fury. It would be better to be cold, as though none of this mattered to her. But the thread of hurt runs too deep for that. “You made me queen of nothing. You _tricked_ me. If you thought I hated you before, it’s _nothing_ to what I feel now.”

He doesn’t answer, and she can’t stop herself from continuing, her hand twisting the sword so that the point digs in. “Answer me, my husband. Did you expect me to walk timidly into exile? Did you expect me to surrender? Did you expect to _win_?”

“No.”

She bares her teeth. “Then perhaps you’re not so stupid. I will destroy you for this.”

Finally, he meets her gaze, and his dark eyes are steadier than she expected. “Will you kill me like this? Bound up and helpless at your feet?”

“Are you expecting honor from a spymaster?”

“I suppose not.” His gaze is hot and piercing. “But I suspect you have it, anyway. Or you want to.”

She flinches. As always, he has the strange ability to reach into her heart and pull out the deepest, most protected desire.

Honor. Knighthood. These were her dreams not so long ago.

Perhaps she dreams of them still.

She swipes the sword downward, and Cardan’s body goes rigid. But the edge simply cuts through the bounds at his feet. She does the same for the ones at his hands, and he stands unsteadily.

“You’re far from Faerie,” she tells him, as she adjusts her body to match his stance and distance. “No power to draw on from the land. No crown.”

The cut on his neck bleeds freely, and he cups it with one hand. When he looks at her, his eyes hold admiration. “You really are remarkable.”

This isn’t what she expected, nor what she wants. “The time for flattery is long past, Cardan." 

“I’ve missed you.”

Her expression cracks, and she takes a step back. He’s doing it on purpose, she’s sure, trying to act as a poultice to draw up all the hurt. To make her weak. But even knowing his strategy, she can’t help the way it works at her, softening the hard edges of her anger. Her eyes drink him in; the proud set of his jaw, the softness of his mouth.

She’s missed him, too.

“Don’t,” she commands, closing her eyes against it. “I’m done with fairie tricks. Especially yours.”

“I cannot lie.”

“You miss someone doing all the grunt work for you. You miss tormenting me.”

“You look better,” he says instead of answering. “You were still so frail when you left.”

The concern in his voice sounds so real that she almost believes it. Almost spins the tale of Cardan banishing her to protect her. But no one has ever protected her in Fairie, and she knows that wasn’t his intent. He freed himself from her control, and then he rid himself of her before she could reassert it in some other way.

He takes a step toward her. His voice is soft as silk when he speaks, as though they’re whispering to each other from pillows atop his bed. “Do you really intend to murder me?”

She slashes at the air with her sword, the movement more frustration than attack. She’s been away from fairie-kind for too long, and it’s dulled her ability to deal with their flattery.

"Enough,” she says, and her voice is hard as stone again. “You sealed your fate when you exiled me.”

The seductiveness drips away from him, and he tries on pragmatism instead. “But you need me. For Oak.”

She laughs. “Oak will never be High King.”

His eyes go wide. “What?”

She thinks of the legendary smith working in secret on a new blood crown. To Cardan, she only smiles—the kind of smile that is both threat and temptation. _I have secrets, and you shall not know them until it’s too late._

She tilts the sword down and holds the tip over his heart. “Any last words?”

The fear is up close and real on his face, twisting his features in a way she’s never seen before. He holds his hands out in supplication—begging.

“Jude—”

“Don’t bother making an appeal.”

“I love you.”

She had expected him to say a great many things in this moment. To beg and bargain and perhaps weep.

She had not expected this.  
  
Her mouth falls open and her heart thunders in her chest, its pounding echoing in her ears. Beneath the shock is a faint tremble of hope, like a caged bird in her chest. She smothers it with the flame of her fury. “Such trickery is beneath even you.”

“You know I speak true.”

She doubles the pressure of the sword on his chest, baring her teeth. “Whatever you feel for me, it isn’t love. Even if you believe it is.”

“I think of you every day,” he says. “Your voice is in my head at every council meeting, especially the boring ones. Every choice I make, I make with you in mind. I want you beside me—I always have.”

“You exiled me. You intended to never see me again!”

 _"Think_ , Jude. The _crown_ can break your exile. Did you believe that was an accident? Did you think I did not intend for you to return, even as I spoke the words of your banishment? My attachment to you weakened me in front of Fairie. They saw too much of us together. They knew what I was willing to sacrifice to retrieve you from the Undersea. And you _murdered_ my brother! I never would have gained and kept their respect if I let you continue serving at court.”

“You betrayed me.” 

“And you have betrayed me at every turn, in every possible way.”

Disbelief roars through her. “You can’t love me.”

“That is not for you to decide.”

The sword trembles between them, her fingers shaking around the hilt. “You promised me everything I ever wanted, and you took it all away. You used my desires against me.”

“You can still have the power I promised you, Jude.”

She speaks the words without thinking, without considering—wanting, for once in her life, to speak truly. “I’m not talking about the power.”

His face goes blank with surprise. Remembering, perhaps, their vows; their bodies twining around each other in the dark.

“You hate me,” he says, as though reminding her. “Now more than ever.”

She thinks of something Balekin told her a long time ago. “Perhaps I have confused love and fear.”

He looks at her, uncomprehending. His hands are still held out to her, still beseeching. His face is so achingly familiar, carved into the private spaces in her heart. Her beautiful, wicked king.

Finally, she lowers the sword, dropping any pretense that she ever meant to kill him. He follows the weapon’s movement with his eyes, then looks back at her.

“This is simply a diversion,” she explains.

Understanding lights his eyes. “For what?”

“Luring your knights away to search for their missing king.”

“To what end?”

“Madoc’s forces will move in to take the kingdom.”

His eyebrows rise. He doesn’t look particularly surprised, as though he always expected to lose the power she gave to him. There is regret on his face, but also resignation. “So you do intend for Oak to take the throne?”

“No,” Her smile is wide and cruel. “I mean to betray Madoc in the same way I’ve betrayed you.”

“Then who will rule Fairie?”

“Isn’t that obvious?” she asks, and flips her long, brown hair over her shoulder. She holds her head high, as though a crown rests upon it. “I will.”  
  


* * *

  _Watch me make ‘em bow_  
_one by one by  
__one._

* * *

 

**Author's Note:**

> Wrote this because I was completely beside myself after reading The Wicked King. I just—holy shit. Hopefully this eases the ache of that ending a little bit. Also, the title and quoted lyrics come from "you should see me in a crown" by Billie Eilish. If you haven't heard it, listen to it RIGHT NOW. It's the most Jude thing I have ever heard.


End file.
